"Stuff is eaten by dogs, broken by family and friends, sanded down by the wind, frozen by the mountains, lost by the prairie, burnt off by the sun, washed away by the rain. So you are left with dogs, family, friends, sun, rain, wind, prairie and mountains. What more do you want?"
Federico Calboli

Tuesday, April 01, 2014

Ivanpah

Back in February, Connie and I flew from Denver to John Wayne Airport in Orange County to visit our kids. Shortly after we crossed the Colorado River into California, we saw flashes of light out our window on the north side of the plane. Knowing solar energy as we do from our work, we quickly identified it as reflections from the mirrors and power tower at BightSource's Ivanpah solar plant. You can read more about the plant here.

It was quite an amazing sight, and there was some talk from other passengers who didn't know what it was and thought it must be a UFO or something.

I cannot take credit for this picture. I did not have my camera to hand and found this picture later in an article written by a person who had the same experience we did. I can say this looks almost exactly like what we saw out our window.

If you find yourself flying in this corridor in the future, look for it.